Demica moves its European know-how stateside

As a younger securitization market, Europe is used to seeing technology imported from across the Atlantic. In a reversal of this trend, one company is taking its experience in Europe and exporting its product to the more mature U.S. market. Demica, a provider of specialized securitization structuring and invoice finance reporting solutions, has consolidated its position in the U.S. market with the opening of an office in Atlanta.

"In securitization, the U.S. market was the first to develop but Europe has taken off nicely," said Barry Wood, senior vice president of sales who heads the new U.S. operation. But Wood said that the technology available for European trade receivable transactions has not been available in the U.S. "We are looking to provide [this] infrastructure for better reporting in trade receivable transactions," he said. "The information in the U.S. has historically not been as good as what is available across the Atlantic and some deals as a result can't get done."

Wood joins Demica with over 15 years of structured finance and ABS experience. He aims to consolidate Demica's robust business growth in the trade receivables securitization area - focusing mainly on the banking community, private equity houses and the monoline insurance industry - as well as develop new market opportunities in supply chain financing.

The new hire said that the Demica technology would bridge the information inadequacy currently hindering some deals from getting completed. Demica has been solving these problems in Europe but Wood said that the technology applied to U.S. deals would be less complicated compared to that designed for multi-jurisdictional Europe. "In the U.S., these transactions are subject to the same regulatory scrutiny across the board - it's less complicated than it is on the continent," he said.

Although the Atlanta office is currently a solo operation supported by Europe-based consultants, in a year's time Wood expects the operation to grow and have five to 10 individuals working for it, which would eventually include U.S. based consultants.